midimouse (Mac OS X)

[update]: Just released a beta version of midimouse 0.7 that will run on Mac OS 10.7 (Lion) and Mac OS 10.8 (Mountain Lion). Unfortunately some User Interface Elements and the Wii stuff weren’t compatible, so I had to remove it. As I’m quite busy, this version hasn’t been tested very well. (see Download)

midimouse is a small, easy-to-use and very simple program. It sends MIDI-controller-messages (CC) by moving the mouse over its (resizeable) window. While moving the mouse (with or without mouseDown) over the X-/Y-axxis, each axxis sends a CC, so you might send values within up to 4 configurable Controllers.

The default CC’s are:
CC12 and CC13 for X/Y and
CC14 and CC15 for X/Y with mouseDown*
(* not available in “clickThrough”-mode)

So, what’s it for if you’ve never heard of CC’s?
You can make music with it! Just connect it as a MIDI-Controller to your hardware-synthesizers or software-programs (eg. Ableton LIVE, Propellerheads Reason, …) and you can control the effects by moving your mouse – on a small screensize or even also on full screen, if midimouse is in “click-trough” mode. It’s like a virtual KAOSS-Pad!

License:
Creative-Commons (by-nc-nd), that means free for private use and you are welcome to copy and share midimouse! Please ask before trying to use midimouse commercial (that means before you try to _sell_ midimouse, standalone or bundled; of course you might _use_ it for free on any occation).
Parts of midimouse are built upon the PYMIDI.framework from Pete Yandell. Thank you Pete!

Screenshot:

Download:

· v.0.7 beta: midimouse_110723_07b.zip (Mac OS 10.7. – 10.8. Intel)Please leave a comment or contact me, if you have issues with this version or found a bug, older versions are still available below!

46 thoughts on “midimouse (Mac OS X)”

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there is no hurry!
the sources would bring me nothing, .plist-editing is one thing, coding another ;-)

i extended my project in a very special way:
i finally can use my wacom to “steer” midimouse – i defined an area where the wacom is working (upper left edge of my screen, EXACTLY where my windows of midimouse are, no pixel further) and placed 2 midimouse-instances side by side – my wacom is now split in two halfes, each one steering 2 midi-channels (only with pressure (like mouse-button pressed), everything else is too risky for a liveact)…

i can post more information if anybody wants it…

a yeah, another suggestion:
the “resize-edge” in the lower left corner of midimouse, could you add an option to disable it? me and my wishes, i know ;-)
but if i accidentially start in this corner i am resizing the window, and thats not good during a liveact ;-)

Hi – have you had any experience using Midimouse with Traktor Pro – I’ve tried it using various channels and various ports (midimouse and IAC driver). Traktor can see both of these ports in the “Midi Setup” preference and I can select either, but then no midi signal comes through. There is a light at the top of the Traktor Pro GUI that lights when a midi signal is received even if it isn’t mapped and this light doesn’t come on at all.

It looks like such a beautiful program and I would love to use it as an FX controller.

as I am not working with Traktor (nor 3 neither Pro), I’m not sure I can be of any help here. If it works with Traktor 3, this indicates that the problem might be with Traktor Pro; maybe you’ve overseen some preferences or so? Sometimes it helps to restart the Applications.

For any kind of Midi problems, I can recommend MIDIMonitor, a simple application that shows you outgoing and incoming MIDI signals. This way it’s very simple to say which app isn’t working as expected: http://www.snoize.com/MIDIMonitor/

A similar function (AList) is also in MIDIPipe, but this is a bit more complex to setup, so I’d suggest to try MIDIMonitor.

Hi! great application!
What would be reaaallly cool is a pitch bend feature, and something like a full screen/relative mode (relative to the point where i clicked, so i could press the mouse button, pitch notes up with the touchpad, and when i release the mouse button pitch bending returns to zero).
hope you like that idea too,
martin

Does anyone know if this works with Reason Adapted?
If so does anyone know what I should do to set it up? When I open Reason I can choose midimouse as a controller, but it is having no effect.
I’m sure I’m doing something stupid, can anyone help?

Hey, just published an updated version of midimouse that runs on 10.7 and 10.8.
Sorry for the wait, but it actually slipped my mind two years ago and no one ever asked for it until today. So here’s the 0.7 update (not really tested, though it should work), enjoy.
Michael

About midimouse and NoteOn messages: midimouse will only create Control Changes (CC). Every noteOn needs a corresponding noteOff, otherwise you’ll end up having hanging notes.

It’s not trivial to decide about noteOffs with mouseMove events only; that’s why I decided against it, but there’s software out there that you can use to change midi messages, for example MidiPipe. You can convert any CC to Note_On, Note_Off or Pitchbend values.http://www.subtlesoft.square7.net/MidiPipe.html